Andy
Jake’s mom, Sandra, drove us to the cottage on Sunday. Jake, being Jake, felt guilty about it.
“I’m sorry you had to waste your one day off work,” he told her when we were on the freeway. I was in the back seat chilling. It wasn’t like I could do much to keep myself entertained with both hands wrapped up.
“Don’t be silly! Of course I wanted to see you—you’ve been injured. And I’m still mad that I couldn’t make your graduation.”
“It’s fine, Mom. We celebrated with Sierra at Christmas.”
“I know, but still. Are you sure you won’t come home for the summer?”
Jake shook his head. “You can’t take time off work to take care of me. And Andy already has a nurse lined up, so it makes the most sense for us to hang out together. Plus, no one else has to listen to us whine.”
“I know. But I worry when you’re sick. Make sure you follow the doctor’s instructions exactly. God forbid you get an infection or that flesh-eating bug or something like that!”
Jake nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. That hadn’t actually occurred to me as a possibility. But thanks for putting it in my head.”
“Nom nom nom nom nom.” I made chewing noises and held up my mummy hands threateningly.
Sandra’s eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. It was a warning look, her mouth pressed tight. I stopped making chewing noises.
“And you, Andy!” she scolded me. “I appreciate your helping us out this summer, but Jake would be in California working by now if not for you.”
“Mom!” Jake groaned.
“I know, I know! You said you’re responsible for your own decisions, and I agree. But the two of you together are like matches and gasoline, I swear! I hope after this incident, you’ll both stop these dangerous tricks. You’re lucky you weren’t killed!”
“Don’t worry, Sandra. I’ll be extra good.” I made a cross-my-heart gesture with one mummy hand. Which was sort of ironic and funny. I swallowed the smile, though.
“So . . . how’s work going?” Jake asked her, no doubt trying to take the pressure off me. Good man.
His mom started talking about her job at the dentist’s office, a subject which frequently referred to disgusting procedures and tales of horror. But at least I was forgotten for the moment. I watched the two of them talk, Jake prompting her now and then with a “What happened?” or “Seriously?”
Jake and his mom didn’t look much alike. They had the same small, straight nose, but Jake was five eight with an average build. His mom was like five foot nothing. Jake’s hair was dark and straight. Hers was dirty blonde and kinky. His eyes were a chocolate brown like liquid Hershey kisses. Hers were a drab blue. He was also a lot smarter than his mom, in the academic sense. Very logical. I figured he’d gotten that from his dad, Mr. Tax Accountant and Serial Monogamist.
“Andy has that all figured out. Don’t you, Planinator?”
I blinked and looked at Jake in the front seat of the car. “Huh?”
“I was telling Mom you have everything thought out. How we’re going to bathe and eat and all that stuff.”
“Pretty much. Of course, Jake is much less dexterous with his toes than I am, so he might have to forego the peanut butter sandwiches.”
I was joking. I’d learned a lot at the hospital after just two sessions with a therapist, but very little of it involved toes. The PT person, a chick named Debbie, had known all kinds of tricks, and my dad’s super-special insurance had paid for some handy tools from a medical supply place. But, in the hospital, there had always been someone around when I ran into trouble. The nurse would only be at the cottage for a few hours a day. We had some surprises ahead, no doubt.
“Well, I still feel bad leaving you boys on your own in your condition. Promise me if it’s not working out, or if you need anything, you’ll call me, both of you.” Sandra’s eyes looked into mine again in the rearview mirror.
“Sure,” Jake said.
“Absolutely, Sandra,” I agreed.
But we wouldn’t. I knew Jake. We could be wallowing on the floor in vomit and our own excrement, covered in sores, and he wouldn’t call his mom for help. Because she had “work” and he hated to cause her any trouble. And I wouldn’t call her for fear she’d come pick Jake up and I’d never see him again.
I smiled at her reassuringly, though.
It’d be fine. We had each other, and we were smart and creative. Besides, all we really had to do was relax and heal. Just Jake and me. Given the crazy shit we’d done in the past, this had to be a cakewalk.
May 2010 - Ninth Grade
Jake
I stared at my best friend. “You’re insane. Loco! The sanity train has left the station, dude. There’s no way I’m doing that!”
Despite my words, I was, in fact, not all that surprised at Andy’s suggestion. He had a thing for the bizarre. Recently, he’d made me watch this video of a circus where the performers chewed nails, were lifted by piercings in their back, and put razor blades up their nose and stuff. It was gross. But Andy loved that kind of thing. Street magic too, like David Blaine and Criss Angel. He loved the way people freaked out at that stuff.
But this was one gross-out too far.
He held the box out to me. It was made of clear plastic that was probably specifically designed for insects because there were tiny air holes in the top. Inside were three wiggling green creatures. “Come on! They’re perfectly harmless, I swear! Wanna see me eat one?”
“No!”
“So, the trick is to get a bunch of saliva in your mouth,” Andy explained patiently, “sort of at the back, like a little well, then open wide, drop it in there, and swallow really fast. You can’t even taste it.”
“Don’t!”
Of course, Andy ignored me. He drew in his cheeks, gathering spit, picked up one of the green, disgusting caterpillars from the box, tilted his head back, opened his mouth, and dropped it in. He gulped quickly. Swallowed again. Then he took a drink from the bottle of water he’d stuck on a nearby half brick wall, grimacing a little. Finally, he looked at me with a big smile even though his eyes were watering. “See? Nothing to it!”
I put my hand over my mouth. “Oh my God, that was disgusting. I need to scrub my brain. No, I need an actual lobotomy after seeing that.”
“I know!” He grinned excitedly. “Isn’t it great? Just imagine how much worse it’ll be if people think they’re poisonous. They’ll go fucking nuts!”
This was such a crazy bad idea. It had started when Mr. Bademeyer in biology had brought in some new critters for his tanks. He was into weird life-forms. Come to think of it, Mr. Bademeyer was a weird life-form. But, anyway, he had a tarantula, lizards, and other creatures in tanks in his room. Last week he’d added green fuzzy caterpillars from Brazil that he said were the “deadliest caterpillars on earth.” They killed a couple of people a year.
After that class, I’d seen a dangerous spark in Andy’s eye, and I knew it’d meant trouble. But he hadn’t mentioned the caterpillars again until right now.
“Are you sure those aren’t actually poisonous? I thought all caterpillars could bite.” I eyed the box warily.
“Nah. I got these down by the river, and I Googled them. They’re just a garden-variety type. It’s really hard to get them to bite you, but even if they did, you might get a little swelling, that’s it. And when you swallow ’em fast, they don’t have time to bite. I ate two last night and I wasn’t nauseous or anything.”
“You ate two last night?” I sputtered. “By yourself? What are you, Hannibal the bug cannibal?”
Andy’s smile faded and his eyes softened. He punched me lightly in the shoulder. “I had to make sure they weren’t dangerous before I talked you into it. You know I’d never hurt you, Jake.”
Oh fuck. The bastard. He played me like a snare drum kit. I was so going to give in.
I looked away and stuffed my fists in the pockets of my jeans. It was suddenly awkward. Andy and I didn’t say gushy things to each other. Which was probably for the best. Because once I got started, I’d probably never be able to stop.
“So are you in?” Andy urged. “Let’s do it at lunch today. It’ll be awesome.”
“I dunno.”
“I dare you. Come on, you saw me do it. It’s no big deal. Please?”
Of course, I caved in like a cardboard truck run through a car wash.
A few hours later in the lunchroom, I was nervous as hell. I forced myself to eat the corn and hamburger casserole the cafeteria was serving on the theory that it would be better to have food in my stomach for the caterpillar to mix up with than for it to be empty. I only hoped I wasn’t going to see that casserole again real soon in the bathroom.
Andy stood up, his chair scraping loudly. A few people looked at him. We were just lowly freshmen at Dunsbar High School, but Andy was popular. His parents had money, he played every sport there was, got good grades, and was stupidly cute on top of all that. As his best friend, I did okay too, even if I wasn’t as big on team sports.
He took the little plastic box out of his pocket, held it up with a flourish, and showed it around. The box was clear, so you could see the creepy crawlers in it even from a distance away.
“Oh my God, what is that?” a senior girl said with horror.
“I borrowed a few of the Lonomia caterpillars from Mr. Bademeyer’s room. Deadliest caterpillars on earth!” Andy announced. He took a step and, with a quick thrust of his arm, showed the box to the girl. She screamed, scrambled out of her chair, and backed away, her face pale.
I hid a smile. Andy was right. This was awesome. By now every eye in the cafeteria was fixed on Andy.
“Don’t worry,” Andy said. “It can’t bite you from inside the box. You’d have to hold it or something. Like this.” He opened the box, took out one of the bright-green caterpillars, and put it on the back of his hand.
I’d seen the spiky green monsters that Mr. Bademeyer had, and these caterpillars didn’t look much like them, but no one seemed to notice or care. Based on the disgust, fear, and horror around the room, everyone was buying it. There were a lot of comments like Get those things out of here! And No way! And That is so gross! There was even a threat to call a teacher, but no one moved to go get one. Andy had chosen his timing well, because I didn’t see any of the usual lunchroom monitors.
Andy raised one eyebrow at me. That was my cue. Now more excited than nervous, I stood up and put on a worried face. “Dude! If that thing bites you, you’ll be dead in, like, ten minutes. That’s what Mr. Bademeyer said.”
“Really?” Andy shrugged, examining the caterpillar crawling up his wrist. “I thought that was just, like, old people who could die.”
“No, man!” I insisted. “They’re more lethal than Cottonmouth snakes! Weren’t you listening when he told us about them?”
There was a wave of gasps and groans and, en masse, the entire room of people backed up, trying to get a few inches farther away from Andy and that little green insect. Sheer sadistic delight bubbled up inside me, but I couldn’t let it show.
This was brilliant! I could tell from the way Andy’s eyes shone that he was totally into it too.
“Huh. Dare me to swallow it?” he asked me suddenly.
“What?” I acted surprised.
“Oh, hell no!” some guy muttered in a shocked voice.
“Do you dare me to swallow it?” Andy repeated with a challenge in his voice. “Because I will.”
“Andy, don’t be an ass!” That was Karen, a freshman cheerleader. A half dozen other kids agreed, telling Andy he was going to hurt himself.
Andy ignored them, staring at me. “Dare me! If I die, I won’t blame you. I swear.”
That made no sense, but it sounded theatrical. “Yeah, okay. I dare you! Swallow that bad boy. Come on! Do it.” I put my hands on my hips and tilted up my chin, egging him on.
“I will . . . but only if you do it too.” Andy held out the box to me. “Dare you.”
I tried to look cornered and like I was pretending to be brave even though I was scared. Oscar material, man. I took the box, my hand shaking only a little. Okay. Here was the not-so-fun part. But, honestly, with everyone staring at us, horrified and fascinated, some laughing, some with hands plastered over their mouths, eyes wide, it was surprisingly not that awful. What was swallowing a bug compared to that kind of attention? Hell, even the seniors were completely hooked. And people ate way grosser things on reality TV shows all the time.
I opened the box and started gathering saliva in the back of my mouth. Oh my God. I can’t believe I’m doing this.
Andy brushed his caterpillar into his palm and held it up to his mouth. “Ready? One. Two . . .”
I put the second caterpillar in my hand, preparing to pinch it with two fingers and toss it down.
Andy’s blue eyes, bright as rocket flares, stared into mine. I could do anything when he looked at me like that. I could fucking fly. My heart jackhammered in my chest.
“Three!”
We tossed them down.